All Fizz, No Head

[coreycowens]

I just opened my first bottles of homebrew, and I'm finding that the beer is fizzy and... "sharp", but no head at all and not smooth. There's clearly been a lot of natural carbonation, but in a way that creates an almost tart mouthfeel and zero head. Help? What did I do wrong?

 

[Yooper]

It's hard to say without knowing more about the beer. My first impression is that it's probably young, and been in bottles less than 4 weeks. If that's the case, time will fix it.

Another thing that might help is to chill the bottles in the fridge at least 48 hours before opening.

 

[Scut_Monkey]

How long did you let it carbonate in the bottle?

Edit: Ooops, Yoop beat me to it.

 

[coreycowens]

Bottled on 2/15. Hopefully will get better with time.

 

[cheezerman]

I suggest listening to the BrewStrong radio show on Head Retention

http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/Brew-Strong/Brew-Strong-09-01-08-Head-Retention

 

[smizak]

It takes two weeks MINIMUM in the fridge after a 3 week room-temp conditioning/carbing period for my beer to hold a good head. The big issue is that a lot of chill-haze proteins are still in your beer. They cause most of the CO2 to quickly come out of solution and disrupt the head forming proteins. After some cold conditioning, when the beer looks really clear in the bottle, your head retention will probably be much better.

 

[funkapottomous]

I had this happen with my first batch of homebrew from Mr. Beer, and it was SUUUUUUUPER carbonated, but gave me no head.

lo and behold, I take a 2 liter bottle to the girlfriend's parents and pour it warm into a different style of glass and blammo:

I think it was that my priming sugar was eyeballed in my smaller bottles, and I may have added to much ( hence the high carbonation)

 

[Scut_Monkey]

Give it more time in the bottle. If there is still not head or no head retention listen to the podcast posted above. It helps you to understand why carbonation and head retention are not the same thing.

 

[Scut_Monkey]

Also, check that your serving glasses are free of any oil or dirt by hand washing and rinsing very very well.

 

[Futureman]

This is a helpful thread. But my first home brew experience posed a slightly different puzzle. After a week of bottle conditioning, I decided to crack one open just out of curiosity. The beer had been conditioning at about 66 F. Although it was early, the beer had a great head. A week later, I decided to chill a beer in the fridge and try it out. The result: lots of fizz but no head. I was surprised by this since I originally saw good head retention early on. Was the lack of head retention caused by (1) the cold fridge, (2) insufficient time in the fridge, or (c) something else all together?

 

[Revvy]

This is a helpful thread. But my first home brew experience posed a slightly different puzzle. After a week of bottle conditioning, I decided to crack one open just out of curiosity. The beer had been conditioning at about 66 F. Although it was early, the beer had a great head. A week later, I decided to chill a beer in the fridge and try it out. The result: lots of fizz but no head. I was surprised by this since I originally saw good head retention early on. Was the lack of head retention caused by (1) the cold fridge, (2) insufficient time in the fridge, or (c) something else all together?

The answer answer lies in the fact that you were storing it a 66 degrees and opened it at only one week.

It's only been 5 days in the bottles, relax.

The 3 weeks at 70 degrees, that that we recommend is the minimum time it takes for average gravity beers to carbonate and condition. Higher grav beers take longer.

Stouts and porters have taken me between 6 and 8 weeks to carb up..I have a 1.090 Belgian strong that took three months to carb up.

Everything you need to know about carbing and conditioning, can be found here Of Patience and Bottle Conditioning. With emphasis on the word, "patience."

Look at the video in the thread, what you thought was head was really more like what poindexter shows at 1 week in the video. Carbonation hasn't locked in yet, Hence when you chilled them, they didn't seem carbed.

Get them over 70, leave them alone for a couple more weeks, and they will be fine.